Conventionally, a subscriber to a cable or satellite provider accesses content using a set top box connected to a display device. When selecting content to be accessed at a given time, the user may employ an electronic program guide (EPG) that is displayable on a screen in response to receipt of a user generated of a control signal using a remote control. The EPG typically is a tabular formatted user interface that presents a listing of channels and information about programs on those channels for a given time period. The guide information displayed in the EPG user interface is sparse due to the limited screen real estate of the display device. Therefore, the guide is only able to display limited information about respective programs. For example, current EPG's merely list the program name, start and end time, a brief description, cast list, and possibly a rating (as in a television program guide TV-PG).
Additionally, the EPG data is displayed to the user in a linear fashion organized by channel and by time. While cable/satellite operators have attempted to improve EPG guide navigation by grouping channels that are known to broadcast similar types of content. For example, a cable provider may set aside a block of channels that are known to broadcast sports content and a separate group that are known to broadcast home improvement or comedy content. While channel groupings have improved the ability of the user to find content that may be interesting, this method of content organization is limiting because a user is only able to view the limited programming on the set of channels at a given time. A drawback associated with accessing the content available is that it can be a tedious task for a consumer/user to sort through and locate content that may be interesting to them and aggregate it in a meaningful manner. Therefore, there is a need to improve the surfing speed of the electronic program guide that enables faster selection of content derived from a larger set of content spread across multiple sets of channels.